


we're going home

by sultrysweet_tumblr (sultrysweet)



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Angst, F/F, Hurt/Comfort, emma sort of meets roni, season 7 ficlet, tiny bit of fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-16
Updated: 2018-03-16
Packaged: 2019-04-01 05:21:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,372
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13991334
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sultrysweet/pseuds/sultrysweet_tumblr
Summary: Regina's still stuck at the bar with her memory restored and no way to safely break the curse when a sight for sore eyes walks in with a charming smile and penchant for inculcating hope in even a pessimist like her.





	we're going home

**Author's Note:**

> This is definitely not what I should have been working on, but it just came out of me as soon as I opened Word this morning. I've wanted to do a season 7 fic since they first teased a glimpse of Roni, but I'd never found a way to do it that satisfied me. This is left open-ended and it's easy to either continue or expand upon, but I probably won't do either. I think that's the reason why I didn't hate this version of a season 7 fic like I hated all my other unfinished attempts. 
> 
> Anyway, I hope you enjoy. Maybe let me know what you think?

Regina hears the rain pounding against the pavement outside and dripping from the roof and along the brick walls when the door to Roni’s opens but she doesn’t look up. She busies herself with an order from a customer at one end of the bar and then turns her back to start cleaning a lager afterward. As she’s staring at the glass in her hands, the air shifts around her and she crinkles her brow. Something’s different. Something’s happening. It’s like magic returning to her, but she knows it’s not that because she can’t feel it coursing through her like it used to.

She turns around, glass still in hand, and keeps her eyes on the floor between her and the bar just a little longer. She’s not afraid of what she’ll find when she looks up. Regina doesn’t do scared. Neither does Roni. But she’s unsure, which isn’t rare for her if she’s cursed or not. She just never shows it. Now isn’t an exception and looking down keeps her from acknowledging whatever’s suddenly shocked her like static electricity.

At least until she catches sight of a pale hand and lithe fingers move about in her peripheral vision as someone sits down at the bar.

Regina’s eyes slide up to follow the movement and land on none other than Emma Swan dressed in tight denim and that red leather jacket Regina will never admit she’s fond of. Her jaw drops, and the lager she’s drying with a rag slips from her grasp. Everything stops when the glass crashes and shatters at her feet, but everything else aside from the blonde had already stopped existing for her as soon as she locked onto those familiar blue eyes.

Emma sheepishly smiles at her then, the expression framed between loose curls—blonde locks much tamer than Regina last remembers—and almost mumbles the words, “Guess you remember.” Emma’s eyes drop from Regina’s face to take in her outfit. Regina’s wearing “Roni’s” usual black and floral jacket, a semi-loose _Def Leopard_ tank top she wishes she’d burned after finding that tattoo she’ll never tell a living soul about (aside from her sister) and jeans. “Although what you’re wearing suggests otherwise.”

“H-how,” Regina breathes out, barely louder than a whisper.

“Short version? I did a lot of exploring before finding a way to get back here. And when I did, our home was gone. _You_ were gone. Henry—”

As if on cue, Lucy walks in with their son and Jacinda only a step behind her. Regina hears Emma’s sigh of relief, but the blonde doesn’t know. She hasn’t been here. She’s been off in other worlds far away with another…family. One of two Hooks and a child Regina quickly realizes at that moment isn’t with the other woman.

“Hey, Roni,” Henry greets with a smile while Jacinda and Lucy settle into a booth along the wall. “Can I get a burger with the works, a cheeseburger with no—”

“Onions and no mustard,” Regina completes with ease. “And a grilled cheese with a chocolate shake. You got it.”

Henry smiles a little brighter and says, “Thanks. I keep forgetting they came in here a lot before I showed up.”

Regina smiles back but it’s stiff and pained. He doesn’t seem to notice, but she feels Emma’s eyes burning into her before Henry turns around and heads over to his family.

“Roni?”

Regina winces and looks over at Emma. “ _I_ remember. Zelena remembers. He doesn’t. A lot’s happened since you left.”

 Emma takes a breath and nods. “Right.” She shifts in her chair and looks over her shoulder at Henry and the girls. “Who are they?”

Regina sighs, a bit heavily, but smiles. Tears form but don’t fall as she watches Henry and Lucy talk and tease each other like father and daughter should while Jacinda watches, awestruck as usual. “Family,” she tells Emma just before Lucy looks over her shoulder and beams at Regina. When Lucy waves, Regina’s smile spreads and she waves back until Lucy’s attention returns to their table. “That’s our granddaughter.”

“Wh- Our- We have a- What?”

Regina’s smile starts to wobble as her tears finally threaten to fall. She braces herself against the edge of the countertop and exhales. “We have a granddaughter,” she confirms. “And a fierce daughter-in-law. You missed- You missed so much. The things I had to do.” Her voice cracks on the last word.

Emma’s eyes widen and her voice takes on an appropriate amount of fear when she asks, “What did you have to do?”

Regina sniffles and shakes her head. Very quietly, not likely to be heard (but she is), she confesses, “I had to cast another curse. I had to…curse our own son. And the person who force me to cursed me as well, but then woke me up for their twisted satisfaction while I almost watched Lucy die. I couldn’t- I couldn’t break the curse to save her or Henry would have died.” Finally, tears rolled down her face. “He still could.”

She startles when a cool hand clamps over hers on the bar. Regina’s focus sharpens as she jerks up to see Emma’s eyes watering with tears of her own and the blonde just squeezes her hand harder.

“We’ll figure this out. Together. Like we always do.”

“You have no idea what I’ve been dealing with, what we’re up against,” she almost hisses. She feels the desperate urge to yank her hand away from Emma’s, but there’s a stronger insistence inside her to stay still and allow the small comfort she’s gone without for so long.

“I still remember a formidable woman challenging me with similar words,” Emma teased, but there’s an unmistakable fire in her eyes that borders on angry and not just determined. “What do you say… _Regina_? How about we beat fate…again? Because whoever’s doing this has no idea what we’re capable of.”

“After all this time…? After what I’ve told you and whatever’s happened to bring you here? You still think we have a chance?”

“We stopped a powerful trigger from destroying Storybrooke, we _moved_ the _moon_ and we raised an amazing kid together. We got this.”

And just like that, Regina’s heart soars as hope swells within her. She tenses beneath Emma’s hold, however, and shakily, sadly, asks, “Where the hell were you? All this time… Everything that’s happened here… I could have used you by my side.”

Emma ducks her head and shrugs. “A lot happened where I was, too. But I’m here now. And you had Zelena. And apparently Henry.”

“I forced Zelena to remember, and seeing Henry here is just like when you came back from New York when he didn’t know who I was. Except this time, he was about to lose his daughter like we almost lost him before you broke my curse. I couldn’t hug him. I couldn’t hug Lucy. He needed a mother and all I could be to him was a friend, and I wasn’t a close friend to him either.”

Emma takes a moment, seems to let it sink in and then looks at Regina with that same intoxicating fire from earlier. “Look at it this way. If I’d stayed with you, I’d probably still be cursed like him. Now, let’s save our son. Again.”

Regina wipes away a tear, the first she’s bothered with, and agrees with a nod before she quietly but assuredly admits, “I’ve missed you.”

Emma smiles at her and it’s the exact dopey smile the blonde had given her the night she’d said, “ _But with you, Regina, I always know when you’re lying._ ” There’s a brightness in blue eyes then that makes Regina both weak and strong, wanting to crumble and lose control while also encouraging her to keep fighting. And then Emma tells her, “I missed you, too.”

Regina closes her eyes and Emma slowly turns their hands over. She feels the younger woman lace their fingers and give another squeeze before she opens her eyes. “I want our family back.”

“We’ll get them back,” Emma says without hesitation. Like there’s no other outcome. Says it like they can’t, they _won’t_ , fail. “And then? We’re going home.”

And Regina believes her.


End file.
